


To See Again the Stars of Home

by greatbirdofthegalaxy



Category: Rihannsu - Fandom, Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Enemies to Friends, Episode: s01e08 Balance of Terror, Espionage, Exile, Gen, Mutual Pining, Rihannsu, Romulans, Slow Burn, TOS mayhem, What-If, your author has a lot of feelings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:27:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 18,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25537315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greatbirdofthegalaxy/pseuds/greatbirdofthegalaxy
Summary: What would have happened if, instead of going along with the defeated Romulan commander's wishes at the end of TOS: Balance of Terror, Captain Kirk had beamed him off his disintegrating starship after all? Is he a prisoner, a refugee, a hostage? What can the future possibly hold for Commander Keras now? Will it blow up into a diplomatic incident, pushing the Federation and the Romulan Star Empire back towards war? But most of all - what possessed Kirk to save his mortal rival in the first place?PLEASE NOTE: As of November 2020, this is still a work in progress but it's kind of on pause. I WILL FINISH THIS, life has just been absurd and I've been dealing with a lot, and I've got writer's block. I apologize, thank you for your patience. I would like to ask that people please don't comment to ask when it will be done, as I find it stressful and harmful to the writer's block I already have. Thank you for understanding!
Comments: 51
Kudos: 28





	1. An Errand of Mercy

The Bird-of-Prey _Gal’Gathong_ , the pride of the Imperial Romulan Star Navy, was adrift in the wake of Icarus IV. Sparks flew from every circuit, the engines wheezed in resignation. The Earth vessel had at last struck her target. 

Commander Keras staggered to his feet, pain surging through his body as he slowly became aware of the extent of the damage. He was beaten. His heart sank as he looked around him and saw the bodies of his crew, broken and defeated – he would be the last to go. 

His duty was clear – the ship must be destroyed. Its records, its technology, could never be allowed to fall into enemy hands. One last piece of honor to salvage from his utter disgrace – a mercenary’s death in the Outmarches, foreign stars reflected in his weary eyes, but one last duty done for his homeland.  
The radiation alarm began to wail. The reactor had been breached. He had to act quickly, to enact the self-destruct sequence before he succumbed and left the ship undefended. Gasping for breath, he pulled himself upright and struggled toward the command console. 

The hailing frequencies chimed. It was the Earth vessel. For a moment, Keras hesitated. There was no time to waste. But his nature got the better of him – the damned sentimentality he had never overcome in all his years of military service – he had to see the face of the Earth commander who had so perfectly read his thoughts, anticipated his every move, who had been as his shadow, somehow as a reflection of his very soul. He answered the hail.

So that’s an Earthling, he thought dimly. A face much like his own filled the screen. There was an alien roundness and pinkness to the man, but the features were otherwise familiar, and spark of life in his eyes was the least foreign thing Keras had ever seen.  
“We’re standing by to beam your survivors aboard our ship,” said the Earthling. His voice was stern but kind as he extended the offer of mercy. But Keras shook his head regretfully.  
“No, it is not our way…”

***

Aboard the Enterprise, Captain James T. Kirk looked at the face of his enemy, recognizing a kindred spirit in the Romulan’s intelligent dark eyes.  
“There’s only the one life sign, Captain, he’s the only survivor,” came Nyota Uhura’s voice, quietly, from behind him. “His shields are down, I’ve got a lock.”  
“…in another reality, perhaps I could have called you friend…” came Keras’ voice over the hailing channel. “Just one more duty left to perform…”  
Kirk glanced back at Uhura and nodded, ever so imperceptibly.  
The viewscreen filled with white light as the _Gal’Gathong_ began to disintegrate. Kirk gripped the armrest of his chair.  
“Now, Lieutenant!” cried Kirk. “Get him out of there!”  
“Transporter room one, energize!” Uhura called urgently into her communicator.  
The shimmer of the dematerialization beam glittered amid the shower of sparks cast by the exploding ship. Then the viewscreen went blank, and only empty space lay before them. 

***

Ensign Robbie Steinberg had had strange days on the Enterprise before, but nothing quite compared to this one. When he had been assigned to the main transporter room, he had foolishly assumed it was a quiet posting, a simple job to be done and a shift to be clocked out of on time. Now, not only had he just been through an hours-long game of cat-and-mouse, but he had suddenly been called upon to rescue the cat.  
Orders were orders, he thought ruefully, as he carefully moved the sliders to adjust the confinement beam. It was a difficult beam-out – too much radiation and debris in the area – but when a Steinberg boy set about doing something, for goodness sake, they did the best job there was to be done. That was the family rule.  
And then the Romulan commander materialized before him – his uniform ragged and soaked green with blood, his face covered in soot, but alive and corporeal, all in one piece. Robbie allowed himself a brief moment of smugness, and then the Romulan collapsed on what was clearly a broken leg.  
Robbie instinctively rushed forward as the Romulan looked around in confusion and panic, his eyes darting from side to side like those of a cornered animal. _“Lhi arhem?”_ the Commander cried out. Then he saw the Earthling by his side, and the uniform he wore, and realization began to dawn. He spat a desperate curse – _“Urru Arreinye!”_ – and then his eyes rolled back in his head, and he collapsed unconscious.


	2. First Do No Harm

“Transporter room one, acknowledge!” called Nyota. “Ensign Steinberg, have you got him?”  
Silence. Too long a silence. Then –  
“We’ve got him, Lieutenant. But he’s in terrible shape. Medical team is on their way.”  
Something deep inside Kirk exhaled. He relaxed his grip on the armrest. “Uhura, do you speak Romulan?” he ventured.  
“All three dialects, sir, though it’s all a bit rusty and theoretical,” she admitted.  
“Well, you’d better come down to sickbay with me. Let’s go talk to our guest.”  
“Yes sir.”

When they arrived in sickbay, mayhem awaited them. Every nurse and assistant on staff was rushing around, machinery was beeping and tension was high. The Romulan lay motionless on a biobed, and Dr. Leonard McCoy was nearly apoplectic.  
“Radiation poisoning, third-degree dermal burns, five broken bones, a ruptured – spleen, or something, I can’t even tell – massive blood loss, and _I’ve never treated a member of his species before!”_ McCoy shouted at Kirk the instant he caught sight of his incorrigible captain. “What were you _thinking?_ What good can this possibly do any of us? If I’m not mistaken, this green-blooded little demonspawn just spent the past twenty-four hours trying to blow us all to kingdom come!”  
“Are you going to save him?” Kirk snapped.  
“I took an oath, Captain, it’s my duty to save him,” McCoy scowled. “Never mind that I can only cross my fingers and hope the damn green Vulcan blood in the med freezer is a close enough match to keep him from shriveling up like a raisin – Christine, keep his oxygen up! Landry, push iodine for the radiation! – and then we’ll figure out just what exactly we’re meant to do with him.”  
“I couldn’t just let him commit suicide in front of me,” Kirk blurted out defensively. 

It was beginning to dawn on Kirk that perhaps he hadn’t thought things through properly. He had always believed that a good captain acted on a mixture of protocol and instinct, and always sought to keep room for his heart as well as his head in his decision-making process. Usually, it served him well. Had it failed him this time? Had his impulsive errand of mercy only made their lives intolerably more difficult? He had felt a powerful bond with his Romulan counterpart, an almost mystical connection he’d never encountered before, ally or enemy. He had to understand it, and the idea of letting that link be severed - a link he hadn't even known about a day prior - had been intolerable. Had he acted on foolishness, chasing a mirage?

“Doctor, oxygen saturation is dropping fast, blood pressure is cratering,” Nurse Chapel’s voice was tense. McCoy spat an impressive series of epithets and rushed to the Romulan’s side. Kirk followed him, almost without realizing what he was doing.  
As McCoy bustled around with instruments, monitors and hyposprays, Kirk found himself transfixed by the physical presence of his counterpart. There it was again, the two minds working as one, the subtle background noise of another spirit aligned with his own. But it was faltering – was he imagining things? - he could feel the life force fading within him. _Damn it, whoever you are, hold on!_ he demanded. _This isn’t how we’re supposed to go! You know better than this, you’re trained better than this, get up and fight!_

“Jim, do you mind stepping out of my way?” McCoy grumbled, and Kirk snapped back to reality.  
“Right, sorry Bones.”  
“Doctor, his blood pressure is beginning to stabilize,” reported Chapel. “Oxygen returning to baseline.”  
Kirk looked at the stranger on the biobed. His breathing was steady and deep, and a faint tinge of green – a healthy glow, Kirk supposed – had returned to his cheeks. “Well done, Doctor,” Kirk said faintly.  
“It’s just damn luck, I have no idea what I’m doing,” McCoy scoffed. “He’s ninety percent similar to a Vulcan, but some things just aren’t where they’re supposed to be.”  
Suddenly the doctor noticed Nyota, still standing awkwardly in the doorway and watching the whole scene in clear discomfort. “Uhura, what the hell are you doing here? Can I get you a band-aid, or maybe some Midol?”  
Nyota looked indignantly at McCoy. “I’ll have you know the Captain himself brought me down here to translate!”  
“Translate?! Does he look like he’s in any state to be carrying on a conversation?!”  
Nyota took a deep breath, held it for a few seconds, and let it out slowly. The medical profession was a stressful one, and a critical case from an unknown species was a particularly stressful situation. Of course. “No, of course not Doctor. Why don’t you give me a call when he wakes up. I assume he’s in no state for you to implant a transdermal right away.”  
McCoy looked sheepish. “Right, sorry, Uhura. You know how it is. And no, he’s in no state. Of course we’ll be needing you. Just let me make sure the bastard’s alive in a few hours.”  
“He will be,” Kirk blurted out, before he knew what he was saying. A certainty had arrived somewhere deep in his mind, wordlessly, and he smiled.


	3. Lost in Translation

Five hours later, the intercom whistled and Dr. McCoy’s voice came over the line. “Lieutenant Uhura, please report to sickbay. Our, uh…guest is about to wake up.”  
“And I’ll thank you to keep your opinions to yourself this time, Doctor,” she replied teasingly, then picked up her tricorder and note pad and set off for the turbolift. 

The Romulan would not be able to speak to them directly, now that his voice was no longer passing through the algorithms of the ship's hailing frequencies. Every member of the Enterprise crew, like all Starfleet officers, had been fitted with a small, unobtrusive implant that interfaced with the ship’s universal translator to render seamless communication possible among the international and interplanetary crew, to say nothing of the various alien races outside the Federation they encountered on a regular basis. But fitting a non-Starfleet officer with an implant not only required bureaucratic paperwork, but was also a delicate operation completely unsuitable for a man who had only just been dragged away kicking and screaming from Death’s door. So for the time being, they had to do things the old fashioned way. They needed a flesh and blood interpreter. And not for the first time, the Enterprise could thank her lucky stars that Lt. Nyota Uhura had been assigned to her crew.

She took a deep breath as the turbolift sped along, reciting Rihan conjugations in her head. The language had been well documented over a hundred years earlier, by the almost mythical Dr. Hoshi Sato, out of necessity during the Earth-Romulan war. But now it was an obscurity, hardly studied in Starfleet, certainly never spoken aloud on this side of the Neutral Zone. Nyota had been one of only three students in her graduate seminar when she took Rihan on a whim her senior year at the Academy, and the professor had been indifferent and world-weary. It had been, at the time, little more than idle curiosity and an easy A. Not once, in her wildest dreams, would she ever have expected to use that odd, strangely poetic language in real life after graduation. Certainly not in a situation like this. Why had Kirk insisted on capturing the Romulan commander in the first place? Was he a prisoner? A hostage? A diplomatic pawn? What was the Captain’s end game here?

The doors to sickbay slid open with a whoosh and McCoy greeted Nyota sheepishly. “Sorry about earlier, hon. It’s been that kind of a day.”  
She waved his apology away. “Don’t worry about it. It’s been a strange few days for everyone. How…is he?”  
“See for yourself,” McCoy led her to the Romulan’s bedside. He was still unconscious, but appeared to be simply sleeping peacefully. His complexion was healthy and his breathing was steady. His burns had been regenerated and the soot wiped from his face. His bloodstained uniform was gone, instead he wore a simple set of dark blue linen trousers and a matching plain shirt. Nyota wondered if they were hospital scrubs or prisoner’s garb. She approached him hesitantly, almost afraid of what was about to happen. 

She could hardly avoid noticing that he was marvelously handsome. He had the high cheekbones, dark hair and elegantly-sculpted features of a Greek or Roman nobleman - only his upswept brows and delicately pointed ears betrayed his origin far across the stars from Ithaka and Athens. He could almost be mistaken for a Vulcan, but there was something different about him - a fire smoldering just under the surface, even now as he lay unconscious and defenseless on board an enemy starship, his life at the mercy of strangers. He was their enemy - Nyota had to remind herself of that fact as a pang of instinctive sympathy struck at her heart. He was the commander of the ship that had nearly succeeded in destroying them. 

“Did the Captain give any clues as to what he’s doing here?” Nyota asked quietly.  
“Not a damn one,” replied McCoy. “I did my duty to save him, I’m a doctor. Now you do yours, as a communications officer. Maybe we can get some strategic information out of him and then shove him out an airlock.”  
“Doctor!” Nyota pretended to be scandalized. “All right…I’m ready. Can you wake him up?”  
McCoy nodded and produced a hypospray. “Turns out their bodies use adrenaline the same way ours do,” he muttered, and pressed it against the Commander’s neck. It hissed softly as the medicine passed through his skin.

His eyes began to flutter, and he shifted slightly from side to side. A quiet groan escaped his lips, and then his eyes opened. They were as deep and black as space itself, with all the starlight of a distant galaxy held somewhere beneath the surface. Nyota felt the breath catch in her throat.  
_“Aefvadh,”_ she said hesitantly. _Welcome._ _“Erein Nyota Uhura arhem. Veisa….veisa vihroi?"_

The Commander’s eyes focused and met her gaze, and suddenly filled with fear and anger. He tried to leap to his feet, but the weakness of his healing bones - and McCoy’s hand flung across his chest - kept him right where he was. He grimaced in disgust and laid back down, staring at the ceiling.  
_“What’s your name?”_ Nyota asked again, as gently as she could muster. It was like talking to a cornered wildcat.  
The Commander sighed, and looked back at her. _“You speak Rihan?”_ he finally managed.  
_“Yes, lucky for you. You’re aboard the Federation Starship Enterprise, and we mean you no harm. Our Captain himself ordered your life to be saved.”_  
The Commander cast a searching glance towards the heavens. _“My mysterious sorcerer. My sparring partner. And now my captor.”_  
There was a terribly uncomfortable silence. What could she say to that? He was their captive. And none of them had any right to expect him to tell them anything at all under the circumstances.

He looked back into her eyes. _“You can tell your Captain that my name is Commander Keras ir-Elehu tr’Chironsala, and that until today, I was the commander of the Romulan Imperial flagship. He has captured a fine prize.”_  
_“Keras,”_ she repeated his given name. _“Thank you. He will want to speak with you himself, later.”_  
_“What for?”_ Keras asked bluntly. He propped himself up on his elbows to get a better look at his interpreter. _“You’ll find I’m well trained in resisting interrogation. You’ll get nothing from me, and should not waste your time. Or am I to be paraded through your streets in a cage, naked and chained like a hunted susse-thrai? Is the Praetor’s dream of war to come true after all?”_ His eyes were hard and cold, his voice spiteful.  
Nyota faltered. _“I don’t….we don’t….I don’t believe we wish you any harm, Commander.”_

“What’s he saying?” interrupted McCoy.  
Nyota shook her head. “He’s very frightened, and very angry. He believes we’ve…that we’ve taken him prisoner in order to publicly humiliate him and start a war.”  
McCoy grunted. “I don’t suppose we can say we haven’t.”  
“I don’t know _what_ to say.”

 _“Lieutenant, I admire your skill with my language,”_ came Keras’ voice icily. _“But please be so kind as to leave me in peace. I wish to contemplate my fate alone.”_

Nyota stammered an apology and hurried away. McCoy followed close behind her.  
“Am I imagining things or was that a disaster?”  
Nyota rubbed her temples. “No, it was a disaster. We need to speak to the Captain. We deserve to know what’s going on here….and so does he.”


	4. Nightmares

That night, Jim had terrible nightmares. 

First there were images. War raging all around him. The helm of a craft barely strong enough to withstand the speeds he forced it to fly at, dodging atomic detonations and hiding in asteroid belts. The white light of the fire that consumed his comrades’ ships, one by one, then another, then another, then another. His heart pounding deep in his belly, his hands shaking at the controls, fear threatening to overpower him as ships he recognized as 22nd-century Earth craft dropped out of warp all around him…

Then the images dissolved, to be replaced only by states of being. His mind’s eye saw only walls, as if he were sitting in a corner with his head in his hands. A life passing by, year after year marked by battle, an endless litany of names cried out to the heavens so the Elements could hear and remember. There was the feeling of not having slept in days. The sickness of betrayal at the highest level. The terror and loneliness of - what? What was he seeing, whose life was he living on this film-reel?

Jim’s conscious mind began to struggle against the nebulous realm of dreams. What language was that? No, here, Enterprise, Kirk. Wake up. Breathe. It was just a dream. A dream. The stars out the window are the same ones you’ve always known. 

He rolled out of bed and stumbled into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face. He spent several moments staring intently at his own reflection, focusing on his breath, bringing his thoughts back to the hear and now. It had been a long time since he’d had a nightmare that powerful, the kind that left a shivering mark behind it even after he had returned to the waking world.

***

That same night, Nyota Uhura tossed and turned for hours, unable to find a moment’s peace with which to drift off to sleep. It had been an extraordinarily stressful few days, to say the least, and her brain felt like it was still ringing like a bell after being struck twelve noon. Not only that, but she had dug an entire language out of mental cold storage: now Rihan verb suffixes, pronoun declensions and convoluted levels of formality rose and fell against the inside of her skull like crashing waves. Sometimes she could almost feel certain words gravitating towards each other, trying to form lines of poetry that she felt a vague sense of remembering - had that damned graduate seminar included odes and epics that she’d promptly forgotten about?  
Why this sense of urgency? Why this persistent feeling of fight or flight, of high alert? She was safe, the ship was undamaged, they had come out the other side of a dangerous mission and all they faced now was a simple diplomatic matter. Then why the restlessness? Why the desperate sensation of being a cornered animal, wanting nothing more than to speak and be understood?

***

On the other end of the ship. Lt. Andrew Stiles didn’t sleep that night. He didn’t feel like it. This was no time to sleep. He scrolled through his old family archives again and again, looking at the names and faces of his grandfather and three great-uncles: none of whom he had ever known, because they had died too young.  
_“Their ships have a giant bird of prey painted on their bellies, it’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen. These barbarians revel in war and destruction, they delight in it enough to paint their ships like it’s a carnival to them, it’s all they know and all they value,”_ read the last letter his grandfather had ever sent home. _“I fear I won’t make it back. These bastards wouldn’t show me an inch of mercy even if I debased myself enough to beg. We move out tomorrow to push the front back past Cheron. They’re waiting, just waiting. They aren’t even trying to take territory anymore. They’re just enjoying the game, of taunting us to advance and then picking us off one by one like a cat toying with a mouse and leaving it to die.”_  
Stiles grimaced and grit his teeth. Either his Captain had gone mad, or he had been an enemy agent the whole time. And who could be sure. These Romulans were devious in a way that redefined the word. They had no concept of morality or honor. They were like demons crawled from the bowels of Hell itself.  
Stiles opened his desk drawer to make sure his phaser pistol hadn’t gotten up and walked away since the last time he checked. Switched it on, just for a moment, just to make sure it was working. Flipped a few switches, listened to the reassuring whine of the energy cell charging up. All right. All is well. Maybe he could sleep a few winks after all. For the time being.


	5. Terra Incognita

Keras had been taken prisoner once before, as a young uhlan on patrol near the Klingon border. A band of Orion pirates had attacked out of nowhere, overpowering their small ship within minutes. Keras and two other low-ranking youths had made the easiest targets, and the pirates had thrown them into cages to demand a ransom from the Rihannsu authorities. The authorities, naturally, could not have cared less what happened to a couple of adolescent airlock-scrubbers. They had been held captive for days, awaiting their inevitable fate of being sold into slavery, when a young woman whose name he had never properly learned had managed to snatch a disruptor from the belt of one of their jail keepers, and blasted their way to freedom.

Then she had deliberately stayed behind the other two, drawing the pursuing Orions towards herself to allow her comrades a better chance to escape. Sometimes, late at night when sleeplessness prowled, he could still see the look on her face as she turned the disruptor on herself.

Now, a decorated veteran, with gray hair beginning to come in around his temples, he found himself once again disgraced, imprisoned, and humiliated - only this time, rather than the theatrical extravagance of cages and chains, pirates and torture implements, he was lying in a sickbay bed, having been saved from almost certain death by an Earth doctor. The situation was mystifying to say the least. The humans clearly feltdistaste and even loathing in his presence, with the possible exception of the lovely young lieutenant who spoke such perfect Rihan. But he was being treated with something approaching kindness, even if it was only protocol. They had given him new clothes, as his uniform had been wrecked along with his ship, though the fabric was so thin - and the air of this Earth ship so bone-chillingly cold - that he felt naked and exposed.

The Earth doctor - his name was Makkoi, or something like it- came into his room, holding two metal gadgets and muttering something in that incomprehensible Terran language of theirs. Before Keras had a chance to react, Makkoi had snapped one of the devices around his right wrist - a bracelet of some sort that whined almost inaudibly as a power cell inside charged up. Keras flinched and steeled himself for the inevitable - but no pain came, no shock of electricity or stab of needles. He looked at the device in bewilderment. Makkoi, meanwhile, was waving his hands in his face to try to get him to listen. Keras looked up.

Makkoi held out an earpiece and mimed inserting it with gestures so slow exaggerated that Keras couldn’t help but feel a mixture of affronted and amused. It was only a language barrier, he wasn’t a stupid child. Warily, he slipped the earpiece into place, and in an instant -

“ - so anyway, it turned out there was no way we could give you any sort of modern translation implement without haggling over regulation with Starfleet Command for the next twenty years, but fortunately Uhura still had a few of these old-fashioned ones lying around and was able to modify it to work with your language too.”

Makkoi was suddenly speaking Rihan. The voice echoed slightly in the earpiece, and the synchronization was far from flawless, but Keras could hardly stop his eyes from widening in childish delight. He allowed himself a little joke. “Doctor, you speak with the refined accent of my capital city!”

Makkoi scowled. “I’m speaking Standard Federation English and you know it, and for your information I’m from Atlanta. Don’t lose that earpiece, it’s the only one that works. The Captain wants us in a meeting now that I’ve cleared you to leave sickbay. You’re being officially debriefed. And don’t try to take that security bracelet off, or there’ll be hell to pay.”

***

At last, the two mirror images sat facing each other across the briefing room table. Keras and Kirk looked at one another warily, unsure of who would make the first move. Around the table, Spock, McCoy and Uhura sat taking notes and watching in uneasy fascination.

For his part, despite everything, Keras appreciated the chance to look his rival directly in the eye. This Captain Kirk, alone among the crew of the Earth vessel Enterprise, had something familiar in his bearing and air. The pride and ambition with which he carried himself, the quick-witted sharpness of his voice and gaze. Were it not for the ears, Keras admitted to himself a bit grudgingly, the man could almost have passed for Rihannsu.

“I suppose there’s no point in pretending this is anything other than a standard military debriefing,” Kirk finally said. “So let’s cut to the chase: Commander Keras, did your ship attack those outposts on our side of the Neutral Zone?”

Keras looked Kirk in the eye, motionless and implacable. “Yes.”

“Did you see them destroyed?”

“Yes.”

“Why did you carry out that unprovoked attack?”

“Because those were my orders, Captain, as I’m sure you can understand.” A note of irritation crept into Keras’ voice.

“And what was your mission, exactly?” demanded Kirk. “What threat did those outposts pose to you?”

“They posed no threat at all,” said Keras bluntly. “The original mission was to test the capabilities of our new energy weapon, and our prototype cloaking device. We could have done the same by firing at rocks in an asteroid field. But instead, it was my Praetor’s wish that we make a show of force, and test the strength of our rivals.”

There was a long silence. Then Kirk’s eyes lit up as recognition dawned, and asked the question that had been hanging in the air. “And you don’t agree with your Praetor, do you.”

Keras folded his hands in front of himself on the table and stared at them for a moment, furrowing his brow. Then he spoke, his voice quiet and grave. “Captain, in truth my fondest wish was destruction before we could complete our “glorious” mission. Our Praetor lusts for war, I do not. I have served in battle, our Praetor has not. I have seen too much death, lost too many comrades - including to Earth fighters - to have any desire to see that madness unleashed again. And had we returned home with proof of the Earthmen’s weakness, it would certainly have been so. ”

“Wait a minute,” interjected Uhura, “Did you say you saw battle against Earth ships? But that war was fought almost a hundred years ago!”

Keras glanced at Nyota, and she could have sworn she almost saw a glimmer of mirth in his eye. “Well, I was very young.”

“Are we to understand that you’re a good bit older than you look, Commander?” Kirk said in mild astonishment.

“Am I to understand that you all are children by my reckoning?” Keras shot back. McCoy scoffed in affront, and Nyota struggled to bite back a giggle.

“A hundred and twenty would be considered mere middle age among my people,” Spock put in before things could get out of hand. “I surmise that the Romulans have similar lifespans.”

“Yes, you’d have a good reason for that,” Keras remarked dryly. “And you’re correct. Long lives, to carry long memories. But short childhoods, to make sure we grow up quickly.”

“Well, be that as it may,” Jim brought the meeting back to order, “There are some protocols to be followed here. Negotiations, debriefings, standard procedure - then I believe we’ll be ready to put Starfleet Command in contact with your government and begin talks for a diplomatic way out of this, and a way to get you back home.”

Keras stared at Jim in utter disbelief. “Diplomacy? Do you believe this to be a matter for ambassadors and bureaucrats? You intend to return me to my homeworld?”

Jim frowned. “Our peoples are not at war. And as far as I can see it, a second war is no inevitability. A border skirmish, a debriefed combatant, perhaps an exchange of intelligence or the signing of a new treaty in exchange for your return, and we can all move on with our lives.”

“No, Captain, you don’t understand,” Keras said coldly. “Perhaps over the past century the Earthmen have developed a new approach to diplomacy. The Rihannsu have not. My comrades who now rest among the stars have done their duty to protect our people, by taking their dangerous knowledge with them. I have failed, and failed utterly. I have allowed my ship to be defeated - no, to be _pulverized_ , and with it the bodies of my dead friends, and yet I have allowed myself to be captured. I have exposed the weaknesses of our military to our historic enemies, and thus created a danger to my homeland.

“Were I to return to ch’Rihan with such a fine list of accomplishments, the Praetor would be a paragon of mercy were he to simply imprison or exile me - most likely, I would be ordered to commit ritual suicide. Such an end, Captain, isby design not merely death but erasure, humiliation and annihilation. My house-name would be stricken from the historical record, and not only from myself but from all my kinfolk who were unfortunate enough to bear it.”

Keras’ voice was tight with fury. He looked daggers at his Earthling counterpart, and Kirk began to feel as though his stomach were tying itself in a knot.

In truth, Jim could barely even explain to himself why he had felt so compelled the day before to save the Romulan’s life. Like had recognized like, perhaps - they were polar opposites, yes, but the two poles of a single lodestone. Or perhaps it had been strategic instinct after all: he had seen his enemy cornered, and grasped that he was more valuable alive than dead. All he had known was that his rival Commander could not be allowed to take his own life so soon. But now, with his mirror image sitting across the table from him in flesh and blood, he was beginning to understand that he had not only made a dreadful diplomatic mistake, but also committed an inadvertent act of cruelty.

“It would have been better for you to carry on and let me die in battle - by your own hand, Captain, if you recall - rather than suddenly changing course and deciding to exercise some alien idea of mercy,” Keras went on, his voice growing weary and quiet. “If your intent was to capture a diplomatic hostage, the result has been to create both a prisoner of war in peacetime, and a stateless refugee. I can never return home. And I fail to understand for what purpose you saved my life, for a life I no longer wish to live.”

With that Keras stood to leave, carrying himself with as much dignity as he could muster. He was nothing, now, and no one. But he would not cower before these Earth strangers, nor would he seek to challenge them. The war was over. He had had enough of war.

All the same, he felt their eyes upon him as he left the room.

***

Kirk sat motionless, at a loss for words. Spock regarded him curiously.

“Captain, I must confess I am uncertain as to the best way to proceed,” said the Vulcan carefully. “What may to us have seemed a gesture of potential peace and good will towards the Romulans, and an overture towards diplomatic relations, will clearly not be interpreted as such by the Romulans themselves.”

“I’ve condemned that man to a fate worse than death,” Kirk murmured.

“Don’t exaggerate, Jim,” scoffed McCoy. “At the end of the day there _are_ no worse fates than death. Don’t contradict me!” He put up a hand to silence Jim as he opened his mouth to protest. “It’s a matter of philosophy. That’s mine. He’s from another world, they see things differently, we couldn’t have known.”

“There must be something we can do for him,” insisted Nyota. “I can’t accept that it was a _mistake_ to save a man’s life - you heard him, he’s no enemy of ours, in his heart he wants peace as much as we do!”

“A career soldier following orders,” Kirk agreed ruefully.

“That may be the case,” said Spock. “Whatever political quarrel we have as representatives of the Federation, it is most likely not with Commander tr’Chironsala directly, but with his Praetor. There seems to be no reason to believe the Commander himself planned the attack. And the Romulan government is known to be of a dictatorial nature: it does not surprise me that even a man of strong inner convictions might hesitate to consider the possibility of rebelling against its authority.”

“Do you suggest we incite him to rebel, Spock?” Kirk said testily.

Spock raised an eyebrow. “It was merely an observation, Captain.”

Kirk sighed and leaned back in his chair, looking towards the heavens for an answer. “He said it himself, he’s a refugee now.”

“Oh no, I’d like to see you try that one on Starfleet Command,” warned McCoy. “I know where your head’s going, Jim. But the rule book says what it says about refugee resettlement, the court of public opinion says another. We can’t just swoop down to Earth one day arm in arm with the former commander of the Romulan Imperial flagship and expect everyone to move mountains to find him a nice little house in the countryside.”

“The Doctor’s right,” agreed Nyota. “We all saw how poorly Lieutenant Stiles treated Mr. Spock just for _looking_ like a Romulan… imagine how people would react to the real thing.”

“That’s not entirely what I mean, I’m not concerned for how the neighborhood will treat him,” McCoy countered. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I just don’t trust the pointy-eared little…off-brand Vulcan. It seems to me we’ve all forgotten who he is - Captain, the man carried out those orders whether he wanted to or not, he destroyed those outposts, he fought a battle with us and is only alive because we, Humans with a sense of morality, came out the winners. You think he would have politely beamed us over for a change of clothes and some chicken soup if we’d lost? Jim, we fought a _war_ with these people!”

“And that war is over, Bones, and if I’ve got anything to say about it there won’t be a second one,” Kirk raised his voice in warning. Then he sighed and got to his feet, a wordless signal that the meeting was adjourned.

“We’re just wasting our time arguing over what’s already done. And I may not understand the Romulan Empire or its Praetor, but I believe I do understand this one man. If there’s one like him, there have to be others. Those people don’t want war, Bones. The ordinary people never do.”

“Captain, if I may interject.” Spock got to his feet as well and fixed Kirk with a stern and icy gaze. The meeting was _not_ yet adjourned. “Your understanding of the Commander’s character, including his trustworthiness, seems to be to be based not in logic, but on your so-called “gut feelings” and “hunches.” He claims, while a prisoner on a hostile vessel, that he is a dissident opposed to his government and he never wanted to carry out the orders that he did, nonetheless, obey. While I have no proof that he is lying, it is also quite improbable that he is telling the whole truth.”

Kirk faltered. Spock was right, of course. He was acting on instinct and flying blind. And McCoy was right too: his Romulan counterpart would certainly find no welcome on Earth, unless he were compelled to give up every piece of military intelligence that Section 31 could squeeze out of him - and that, no one could pretend otherwise, could easily lead to war.

Kirk shook his head and turned to leave. “For the time being, have him confined to quarters and post a security detail outside. Keep that tracking bracelet on him and he can eat in the mess hall under guard if he wants. Hell, he can come play chess in the rec room if he wants.”

“I take it you’re tired of losing at chess, Captain…”

***

The sound of the ship’s engines was all wrong. That low, barely perceptible hum that Keras had taken for granted every day on his own vessel was now vibrating on the wrong frequency. The air was too cold - as if ch’Rihan wasn’t chilly enough most of the year, for a race that had evolved on a blisteringly hot desert planet, it appeared that Earth was even worse - and no matter how tightly around himself he wrapped the single, thin blanket his prison-cell quarters had provided him with, he still shivered in the dark. Sleep was, obviously, out of the question. He closed his eyes and saw the grim faces of his crew, who had looked to him for leadership and guidance, who had trusted him to keep them safe and get them home. He heard the rattling last breath of his beloved friend Centurion T'Auethn.

Keras was no stranger to war, and danger was one of his oldest companions. But for the first time in many years, his current predicament threatened to overwhelm him. Maybe he was getting old after all, he thought ruefully. His mind was torn: part of him wanted only to return home, knowing full well it would be the end - but at least he would feel the soil of his homeworld beneath his feet as he faced his fate, and the last thing he saw would be ch’Rihan’s pale blue sky. But on the other hand, wasn’t it his duty as a Rihanh to fight for survival with everything he had? _Mnhei’sahe,_ the Ruling Passion, was the code of personal honor he had done his best to live his whole life by. It permitted many things, but never resignation and surrender. He was alive, and to cease to fight for survival would be an abdication of destiny, a rejection of the passion for life itself that kept the stars burning and had knit the fabric of the universe together on the First Day. He was alive - improbably, impossibly - and perhaps it was the Elements’ will after all that he should live on yet. For what, he didn’t dare imagine.

He gazed out the window at the sea of stars. He wrapped the blanket still more tightly around himself and murmured a short prayer that he hadn’t recited in decades, almost laughing at himself in embarrassment. _Elements, fabric of my body and mind, rulers of the universe, law of all that is seen and unseen. Unmake the shroud of ignorance I have bound my senses with, and let me understand what my destiny must be._

Improbably, sleep came for him after all. And for a few hours, impossibly, he knew peace.


	6. Arma Virumque Cano

When Lieutenant Andrew Stiles was a boy, there had never been any doubt about what his future held. He would study hard, get good grades, stay in shape and keep out of trouble, because the Starfleet Academy entrance exam was not an easy one to pass, and Stiles men served in Starfleet.

Theirs had been a family of service for over five hundred years. Before First Contact, the men of the house of Stiles had served with distinction in the United States Marines. During World War 3, General Robert Stiles had been instrumental in breaking the Siege of Novosibirsk. By the time a more enlightened age dawned, the Stiles men wasted no time in making their mark on the new United Earth’s Star Fleet, serving in tactical and security roles on the earliest warp-capable ships, in the NX program and beyond. They were a distinguished, skilled and immensely proud family, and when news went out that a baby boy had been born to a Stiles man’s wife, cigars and whiskey would be broken out by admirals across the quadrant.

In the 2160s, there were four Stiles brothers serving on board three ships when war broke out with the Romulans.

Michael and John went down with the _Ravenna_ at Deneb IV. Marcus went missing in action just past Proxima Centauri. Stephen saw four battles before being honorably discharged to seek treatment for shell shock, where he returned to Earth as the sole surviving man of the Stiles clan and the only one left to do his duty as male role model for his young nephew, John’s son, Thomas.

Little Tommy Stiles had a lonely and grief-filled childhood, surrounded by loss and absence and pervaded with stories of war. He wasn’t the only fatherless child he knew - easily a third of the children in his school had lost one parent or the other in the war - but it was a void that seemed to weigh more heavily on his family than on many others. His uncle Stephen floated around the edge of the family like a ghost, his eyes always wide and nervous, his voice bleak as he told young Tommy the things he had seen and done while fighting the Romulans, stories that Tommy forced himself to listen to bravely like a good soldier should, but that kept him up all night tossing and turning, staring into the dark of his bedroom and imagining it was the blackness of space. He was eight when his uncle Stephen ran away to a secluded cabin in the woods, and he was nine when they found him hanging from the rafters.

Thomas Stiles grew up to be a stoic and reserved man, and graduated with distinction from Starfleet Academy with special honors in tactical combat scenarios. He married young, to a pretty classmate from the Sciences division, and their first son, Anthony, arrived right on schedule a year later. For a time, all was well. Thomas had built himself a happy family, and created for himself that which had been missing in his life since his earliest childhood.

But as little Anthony grew up - a sunny, smiling boy - anger began to fester in Thomas’ heart. His son’s laughter irritated him, unaccustomed as he was to the sounds of a carefree childhood. The boy’s gentle and sensitive nature repulsed him: it smacked of weakness, a feeble character that would never have been indulged in wartime. More and more, Thomas began to feel nothing so much as spiteful, bitter jealousy of his own son, born with a silver spoon in his mouth and into the arms of the normal family that Fate had denied Thomas himself. And so one night when Anthony was eleven, sulking at the dinner table over one of the many small yet catastrophic indignities of being eleven, his father’s rage boiled over and he struck him for the first time with an open palm, screaming at the top of his lungs _“Be glad you even have a father to treat with such disrespect, you ungrateful brat!”_

Anthony managed to retain some of his easygoing nature as he grew to manhood, but kept a careful distance from other people. He had many friends at the Academy, but few close ones. He married twice, and divorced twice. He pursued his career with the singleminded dedication of the unhappily childless, and achieved a promotion to Admiral before he turned fifty years old.

It was perhaps inevitable, the expression of a latent family gene, when he then married for the third time, to a soft-voiced young schoolteacher who wanted very much to become a mother. After a lifetime spent avoiding family obligations out of fear, Anthony found himself with graying hair, admiral’s pips, and a newborn son - Andrew - in his arms.

And so young Andrew Stiles was raised as a Stiles man should be, with rigorous expectations and high standards, an insistence on military-level excellence from a young age, and Starfleet as the end goal. He was a good son and a good student, and his white-haired father, while severe, was kind to him. _“Disappoint me or make me proud as you see fit, son, that’s all up to you,”_ Anthony often told him. _“But never forget the stories I told you about the war and about our family, and never forget that at least you have a father to disappoint.”_

And then one day, when the mythical Romulans reappeared and a peculiar cross between a refugee and a prisoner of war came on board the Enterprise. Eventually, word began to get around that the Romulan commander was being treated more like an honored diplomatic guest than a prisoner of war - rumor even had it that Captain Kirk had spoken to Starfleet Command about offering the treacherous snake asylum on Earth. And so, one night, Lieutenant Andrew Stiles called his father on a top-security, encrypted subspace line.

“Dad? Do you read me? Listen. I’m in trouble. We fought the Romulans. I swear. The ship even had the bird of prey painted on it like Grandfather used to talk about. They almost destroyed us. But that’s not even the point. I think they’ve had spies on board - our Captain is clearly compromised…”

Back on Earth, in his wood-paneled study, Admiral Anthony Stiles furrowed his brow. “I’m listening, son.”

“The Enterprise destroyed their ship, sir! But at the last minute, _our captain ordered us to beam their commander on board!_ Now everyone’s acting like it’s some sort of diplomatic mission…”

When Andrew had finished telling his father the story, Anthony’s face was as dark and ominous as a storm cloud.

“You were right to tell me this, son. We shouldn’t share this with the rest of Starfleet Command just yet - you know how they are these days, with so many civilians in the service, they’ve gone soft. They’d take this Kirk’s request for asylum for one of our planet’s sworn enemies at face value, and the next thing you know - well. Far be it from me to claim to see the future. But son, we might need to take this one into our own hands…they’ll thank us in the end…”

He narrowed his eyes. “Son, are you prepared to do whatever is necessary - absolutely _anything,_ including disobeying the orders of your commanding officers - to expose this probable infiltration and protect Earth from Romulan invasion?”

Andrew swallowed hard, but nodded.

Anthony offered a rare smile.

“You’ve done well today, son. I’m proud of you.”


	7. Intermezzo - The Exile's Song

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I didn't need to write plot today, I needed to write fluff. Sorry.

Just over a week after his unexpected arrival on the Enterprise, Keras one night felt both restless and bold.

It had been, to everyone’s surprise, a peaceful few days. The doctor McCoy had examined him once more, to ensure that something the Earthman called his _spleen_ was still in the correct place. He had seen the young lieutenant Nyota just once, by chance in a turbolift, and had been pleased by her evident delight in speaking his own language to him. The captain James Kirk had been very tactfully probing him for information - and Keras had found himself speaking more freely than he had ever expected. Always circumspect and roundabout, after all, he was no traitor - but such was his surprising affinity with the Earth commander that he could speak in his usual manner and feel that he was being understood. There was no need to speak on the record of anything but a series of trade deals with the Klingons: his interlocutor would see in a raised eyebrow the growing weakness of Rihan commerce and the struggles of Rihan merchants. The record needed nothing more than a vague commentary on “competing political interests” in the Senate, and a wise listener would read between the lines to understand the growing anger, xenophobia and lust for war in the halls of power, as the Praetor searched for circuses to be passed off as bread. Keras was not a man who trusted easily - he had been too close to the powers that be for far too long to let wishful thinking get the better of him. But this Kirk, he trusted. And this Kirk did not desire war. In spite of himself, and against all his better judgement, Keras found himself developing an affinity with the Earthman that he could almost believe could indeed lay the first paving-stone on the road to peace.

And so one night, Keras decided to test the waters.

He pressed the buzzer that opened the doors to his quarters. As the doors opened, he saw the now-familiar face of Lieutenant Connor, his assigned security minder, looking implacably back at him.

“The Captain has given me permission to visit your ship’s recreation room. I wish to do so, to have a drink and watch the sky pass by out a different window than usual for a short while. I assume I can count on your pleasant company, Lieutenant.” His tone was wry, but no longer bitter.

Connor, stone-faced as ever, simply nodded, and gestured to the Romulan to follow him.

***

It was a cozy evening in the rec room: twice a month, some of the more artistically and musically inclined members of the Enterprise’s crew would gather to observe the ancient Earth tradition of _open mic._ There was singing, and joke-telling, and instrumental jam sessions of varying quality. On one legendary occasion, while the Enterprise was escorting a shipful of diplomats to a conference, a visiting Andorian ensign had recited a popular bawdy romantic comedy-in-verse from her homeworld. The extraordinary part had been the revelation that Andorian romantic and sexual relationships involved four distinct genders. Even now, people would quote some of its more memorable lines and set everyone in earshot to snickering.

Andorians, of course, were one thing, and Romulans quite another. When the rec room doors opened and the Federation crew members inside caught sight of Keras, a grim silence fell.

The musician who had been playing a jazz tune on a small portable keyboard quickly rolled up her instrument and hurried out the side door. Conversations stopped; eyes stared. One young human officer with brown hair and a boyish face leaped to his feet, staring daggers at Keras, his hand drifting involuntarily towards his hip as if reaching for a weapon.

“Oh, sit down, for God’s sake, Pavel!”

It was Nyota. Her voice rang out indignantly as she too got up. “He’s unarmed, he’s a _political refugee,_ and he’s here on the Captain’s express invitation for diplomatic purposes! And you’ve known that all week!” Nyota hissed at the young Pavel, who relaxed his stance but still glared suspiciously at the Romulan interloper. Several other crew members took the opportunity to slink out the door without being forced into the discomfort of good-byes.

Nyota looked Keras in the eye and gave him a pained but still dazzling smile. “Commander Keras, I wasn’t expecting to see you here tonight. Will you join us for a drink?”

Keras looked around uncomfortably. The room had largely emptied out, save for a few small clusters of Starfleet officers huddled around whispering to one another and glancing surreptitiously at him. “No, I’ve made a mistake in coming here, I was not expecting to intrude upon - “

“Computer,” Nyota addressed the replicator decisively, “One bottle of…hmm, 2156 Sauvignon Blanc, the Chateau Picard, and two…no, make that three glasses.” She looked sidelong at Pavel, who had slunk back down into his seat. The replicator whirred, and Nyota raised an eyebrow at Keras. “Well?”

Oh, alas, but the battle was lost. Keras was keenly aware that he had made progress over the past few days in building a rapport with the Enterprise’s captain. This desperate, improvised, foolish attempt to build a bridge of understanding between their two worlds - an attempt he was starting to believe in in spite of himself - could _not_ be allowed to go straight to _Arreinye_ because he couldn’t swallow his pride for twenty minutes and sit down for a drink with a lovely Earth woman and her irritable young friend. So he nodded, and took a seat at their table.

Nyota’s gaze lingered on him for a split second as she poured the pale golden drink into his glass, and her smile softened almost imperceptibly. “This is called wine, it’s one of the oldest and most popular drinks on Earth. It’s made from a fruit called grapes, that grow in warm climates and become sweet in the sunlight.”

Keras took a hesitant sip, and was surprised to find he liked it. Sour at first, then mellowing into a light floral sweetness. It was clearly much less potent than the spicier and stronger drink known as wine on ch’Rihan - the thought came to him that he should be sure to discuss the linguistic differences with Nyota, a thought he shooed away in annoyance - and he began to realize that he was in fact quite thirsty. He drank the rest of his glass in one gulp, and wondered why the young Pavel snickered.

“Tonight you were performing a musical program, I apologize for interrupting,” he said.

“Oh, not at all,” Nyota laughed. “It’s just open-mic night. Everyone who plays, or sings, or tells stories, gets to do whatever they like. You should have been here last week - “ she pointed at Pavel, who gave her a look that could have vaporized a warbird at twenty thousand kilometers - “Ensign Chekov recited all six cantos of _Ruslan and Lyudmila,_ and no one fell asleep even once!”

“Ruslan and -?”

“Folk legends, from my country,” Pavel finally spoke, a bit begrudgingly. “As retold by our greatest poet. Every child knows it.”

“Ah.” Keras thoughtfully poured himself another full glass of the Earth wine. “In my province on ch’Rihan there were many great poets in the past, but unfortunately I never learned much of their work by memory.”

Pavel looked dumbfounded. “You have _poets_ on - ?”

“Well, I was just about to start playing some music myself, right when you came in,” Nyota hastily interrupted, running interference before Pavel could make a fool of himself. She opened a slim black case resting on an empty chair, and the instrument she took out nearly made Keras choke on his wine.

It was a Romulan lute.

No, Keras corrected himself, of course to her it was a _Vulcan_ lute, but names be damned, it was identical. The angle of the strings, the triangular sounding board, the elegant long sweep of the neck. It was hardly surprising - the Declared who fled from Vulcan had taken many musical instruments and works of art along with them, including this popular folk instrument - but to see such a vivid piece of home so far away, unchanged - when she started to _play,_ and the sounds of his youth suddenly reverberated through a foreign ship - made his heart constrict in his chest. Damn, but he was thirsty.

He was beginning to feel slightly foggy-headed and sentimental - it couldn’t be the wine, surely, such a light and mild drink - in fact the bottle was already empty, and he was _completely_ fine. But he had always loved music, and he didn’t know whether to curse or thank the Elements for conspiring to send him off in search of a drink on _this_ precise night.

Nyota finished her song to a smattering of applause from the few people left in the room, most of whom took that as their cue to leave. Pavel reached for the bottle of wine, and frowned upon finding it empty.

“That instrument - “ Keras found himself saying. “We have the exact same lute on my homeworld. We brought it from Vulcan…every schoolchild learns to play.”

Nyota hesitated, then turned to look slyly at Keras. _“Every_ one?”

And before he knew what was happening, his head spinning slightly and his fingertips tingling, Keras suddenly found the lute thrust into his hands.

Nyota watched in amusement as Keras struggled to keep up the appearance of sobriety after putting away an entire bottle of wine in fifteen minutes. The things that happened in Starfleet, honestly. One moment you were on the brink of war, then next, you were drinking and singing together. It was enough to warm the hearts of even the most hardened cynics. She nudged Pavel and giggled as Keras briefly struggled to tune the strings of the lute, muttering something about an archaic scale.

But his hands held the lute with easy expertise, the calm mastery of someone who truly had learned in childhood. And then his elegant fingers touched the strings, and Nyota gasped in astonishment.

Somehow in Romulan hands, trained in the Romulan tradition, the instrument had an entirely different voice. Rather than the silvery, bright tone preferred on Vulcan, Keras coaxed a warm resonance from the lute that made Nyota feel as if someone had wrapped her heart itself in a soft embrace. The tonality was unlike anything she had heard before - the very structure of the scale and thus the foundation of harmony was different - but it had a naturalness and beauty to it all the same. Then he began humming quietly, then, hesitantly, to sing.

Even modern-day universal translators struggled to render sung language accurately. The old-fashioned earpiece she had rigged up for Keras gave up entirely at the very prospect. So his song rang out in pure Rihan, that she alone on the entire ship could understand.

It was an exile’s song. An ancient one, if the dialect was anything to go by. He sang of empty star-roads and a winged traveler fighting a silent war against loneliness and fear. And of a homeworld, somehow, between the lines - the poetry never spoke of it overtly, but the more Keras played, the more vividly Nyota could see ch’Rihan in her mind’s eye, and the more her own heart ached for him that he had found himself suddenly exiled from it. Vast blue oceans, a pale greenish sky, fields and orchards and meadows stretching to the horizon. Great cities of marble and glass, spires topped with winged emblems soaring towards the sun. A valley of stone pillars standing starkly against a starry sky; a great volcanic fissure in an impossibly tall cliff face pouring fire into the sea like a waterfall. There were villages and towns - Mhiessan, Mnaeha, Rat’lheifi, Elehu, Ramnau - where merchants and nobles and travelers and soldiers all bustled through the streets, she could almost hear their voices, see their faces…

She glanced over at Pavel and saw him looking ashamed. It had, apparently, hardly occurred to him that Romulans were also people. _Do you have poets on your homeworld?_ he had almost asked. He might as well have asked if Romulans, too, needed to eat and drink and sleep, or if they were simply a race of automatons bred for war. _Do you have music? Do you feel, do you think, do you love?_

Keras stopped playing, his voice trailing off into an unresolved chord. When he looked up from the lute, as if startled out of a trance, his eyes were filled with tears.

Nyota stepped closer to him and impulsively reached out to take his hand in hers, overwhelmed with pity and compassion. But as soon as her warm hand wrapped around his cool one, Keras suddenly leaped up in surprise, jerking his hand out of her grasp and looking at her in astonishment. His face flushed an odd shade of green. Then he relaxed a bit and chuckled ruefully. “Ah, forgive my rudeness. It’s just that…among my people, to ah, to intertwine hands in that way is a most intimate gesture.”

“Oh!” Nyota’s eyes widened and her hand flew to her mouth. “I’m sorry, to us it means only - I didn’t - um…”

She distinctly heard Pavel muffle a snicker behind her back.

“Thank you for playing,” she finally said. “You….you’re a wonderful musician.”

“It is common in my native province,” he said a bit stiffly. “Just an old folk song that any child would know.”

She looked into his eyes searchingly, and for a moment, the Elements stood still.

Then Keras inhaled sharply and pulled himself back up to a tall and military bearing. He handed the lute back politely. “Thank you very much for your hospitality,” he said calmly. “I do not wish to overstay my welcome.”

He hurried out the door, his head spinning, his cheeks burning with some unidentified combination of emotion and inebriation.

Lieutenant Connor, who had watched the entire scene from the doorway, allowed himself the raising of an editorial eyebrow as he escorted his guest in shambles back to his secured quarters.

At last, Keras returned to blessed isolation, and collapsed spread-eagled face down on his bed. _Curse it, curse it, curse the Elements, curse this exile, curse this destiny, curse whatever was in that bottle. Curse Captain Kirk. Curse the war. Curse this war. Curse all war._


	8. A Routine Planetary Survey

_Captain’s personal log, stardate 1723.3. We are continuing our mission of exploration at the very edge of the Neutral Zone, a poorly-charted area over the past fifty years. Our Romulan passenger is beginning to speak more freely with myself and the other senior officers, and has given us some important information about stellar anomalies in the area. He is still cagey and guarded, and clearly doesn’t trust us with much, but I believe he is beginning to understand that war is not our goal._

_On that note, I have spoken - so far in confidence - to my good friend at Starfleet Command, Admiral Amina Makinde. To say she was surprised to hear that we have the commander of the erstwhile Romulan flagship in custody would be the understatement of the century. But what’s unique about Amina, certainly unique among Starfleet admirals at least, is her ability to listen and think before leaping straight to conclusions based on precedent and regulation. This is, as she recognized, an unprecedented situation._

_And after I explained the situation to her, I believe I can say that she is on our side, and hopes as much as I do that Commander Keras will eventually prove to be a crucial figure in ensuring peace and stability in this part of the galaxy. So far, our plan is to quietly offer him asylum on Earth, without making a big media circus out of the whole thing, in exchange for whatever information he can provide on Romulan technology and culture. Solely to ensure complete intelligence, and preparedness should hostilities ever break out, of course, those are Amina’s words verbatim. And of course, I believe her. It’s some of the other admirals I don’t necessarily trust, and it remains to be seen if Starfleet will hold to its peaceable ideals enough to refrain from moving the first pawn._

_But in all honesty, I see no other choice. It’s one thing to look at pins on a map or knights on a chess board, seeing everything in terms of the faraway machinations of power and politics. It’s quite another to look into the eyes of a man so much like oneself, who now has nowhere to go._

_…He is a warrior, Keras, but he is not a warlike man. Like all the finest soldiers I’ve ever known, Human, Vulcan, Andorian or - now I suppose I can count even Romulan, his dedication to his duty is motivated by a desire to see his loved ones and his countrymen safe and protected. It’s the paradox of the true warrior, in that he has spent his life training for battle, and yet his most fervent wish is a lasting peace._

_***_

On Stardate 1723.3, the Enterprise navigated into orbit of an uncharted M-class planet at the edge of the Neutral Zone. Long-range sensors had picked it up several days previously, and despite the unusual diplomatic situation on board, the ship’s mission of exploring strange new worlds was unchanged. So that afternoon, three ensigns from the lower decks were tasked with suiting up, dusting off their exploration tricorders, and beaming down.

Ensign Aisha Al-Fadel wrinkled her nose. There was a difference between “breathable” and “Earth-like” when it came to planetary atmospheres: this was decidedly the former. There was a hint of sulfur in the air: not enough to be dangerous, but enough to give the sky a yellowish tinge and the breeze a delicate scent of rotten eggs.

“Smells like my grandfather’s chicken coop in Leskovac,” complained Ensign Mladen Stojanović as he poked at the buttons of his tricorder in annoyance. “They only ever send us to the shithole planets, who cares about lower decks, right?”

“Shut up, Mladen,” Aisha rolled her eyes. The third member of the away team, Ensign T’Leri, politely ignored them both.

They were standing on a hillside overlooking a small valley. The ground was sandy and dry, with scrubby, bluish-purple vegetation sprouting here and there. The valley showed clear evidence of a former settlement, long abandoned, but there was no sign of any current inhabitants.

Aisha suddenly squinted at her tricorder. “Hang on…this is weird. Guys, are you seeing this too? The composition of those ruins…”

T’Leri looked at her own readings. “Yes…fascinating. Advanced titanium alloys, and materials that appear to have been mined off-world.”

“So this was a spacefaring civilization?” Stojanović wondered.

“We can surmise so, at least to the extent of orbital and near-system sub-light travel,” agreed T’Leri.

“But scans from orbit showed barely any population, early-industrial period at best,” protested Aisha.

Stojanović shrugged. _“Sic transit gloria mundi,”_ he said ruefully, and kicked a pebble down the hillside. “It’s not as if this wasn’t almost us a couple dozen times before First Contact. I’m honestly impressed we don’t see more planets like this, ones that have blown themselves up one way or another.”

T’Leri looked coolly at him. “You assume that a previous civilization collapsed in war or internal conflict, on what evidence?”

Stojanović looked exasperated. “Oh, I don’t know, knowledge of human nature?!”

“And yet I need hardly remind you we are not considering _humans_ at the moment. Your reasoning is illogical.”

“Oh for crying out loud - you know what I _mean,_ you pompous little - “

As her two shipmates bickered, Aisha suddenly felt a cold sense of dread, and a sixth sense told her they were not alone. “Hey - guys?” she ventured timidly.

There was a barely-perceptible electrical whine. A whiff of ozone in the air.

“Mladen? T’Leri?” Her voice grew more urgent. “I think we should get back to the ship, I don’t think we’re safe here.”

T’Leri turned around and gave her an impatient look. “According to my scans, there is no reason to believe - “

She couldn’t finish her sentence. A white light suddenly burst forth, momentarily blinding them, and a strange web of energy beams materialized around them. They were held fast.

T’Leri’s eyes widened with something approaching fear, and her gaze met Aisha’s furious glare.

“I _told you so!”_ Aisha managed, before they were dematerialized in a transporter beam, leaving the rocky hillside as desolate and lonely as it has been before they arrived.

***

On the bridge of the Enterprise, Jim Kirk looked thoughtfully at the grayish, cloudy planet on the viewscreen, awaiting word from the away team. “Mr. Spock, what are you reading on the scanners?”

“Population is sparse but present, Captain.” Spock peered at his readouts. “Settlements appear to be constructed mainly along the banks of rivers and other bodies of water. Judging by particulate matter content of the atmosphere, I would estimate their technological advancement to be comparable to that of Earth in the earliest years of the twentieth century.”

“I am picking up shortwave frequencies,” Uhura agreed from her station. “Not very powerful, but clearly artificially created. They’ve invented the radio, at least.”

“Very well,” Kirk said. “Uhura, any word from the away team yet?”

Nyota shook her head. “No sir…nothing yet.”

Immediately a little voice began to warn Kirk in the back of his mind. “It’s already past 1700 hours, they’ve missed their check-in.”

“I’ll try to hail them, Captain, it’s possible those same radio frequencies I’ve been picking up are interfering with our communication.”

“There could also be electrical activity in the atmosphere, perhaps due to weather conditions,” put in Spock. “My sensors did just pick up a small discharge of ionizing radiation near the beam-down site.”

“All right, keep trying to contact them.” Kirk bit the inside of his lip. Something was wrong.

A long moment passed in silence.

And another.

“Still no response, Captain,” Nyota said quietly.

“Damn it.” Kirk hissed under his breath.

He had lost crew members before, every starship captain had. It was a tragic inevitability of life when exploring the unknown, and every single one haunted him in the darkest hours of the night. He had long ago promised himself that he would never leave a man behind, not until it was certain that all hope was lost. “Put together a search-and-rescue team and have them on standby. Spock, see if you can scan their area more closely from here. I….” He thought for a moment. “I’ll be right back.”

He walked over to the intercom panel on the wall and leaned close to the speaker, lowering his voice as he keyed in the code to make his call. “Commander Keras, would you please meet me in the briefing room?”

***

Jim put up a star chart of their current position on the monitor, and turned to the perplexed-looking Keras. “How much do you know about this sector of space, Commander?”

Keras peered at the map. “Our intelligence is limited…we are still on _your_ side of the Outmarches, after all…but we have engaged in surveillance and long range scanning, of course.” He smirked every so subtly. “Why do you ask me, of all people?”

Kirk cut right to the chase. “Because three of my crew members have just gone missing on that planet down there, and I want to know anything you know about the specific dangers of this region before I take a search and rescue team down.”

Keras shook his head. “Believe me, Captain, I would gladly help if I could, but I have no knowledge of this system.” But no sooner had the words left his mouth than an idea visibly struck him, and his face grew pale. He quickly turned to examine the star map more closely. “Unless…”

***

The turbolift doors opened and Keras strode onto the bridge as if the Enterprise were his to command, his bearing decisive and his expression grave. Kirk followed just a step behind him. All eyes turned to stare at the Romulan in astonishment. His presence was a captivating one. Given the chance to be, for a moment, neither a refugee nor a prisoner but a starship commander and strategist - he was his true self once again, and radiated intelligence and nobility, courage and strength.

“This sector of space is a lawless graveyard of civilizations,” Keras declared. “In Rihannsu territory, we have charted an anomalous expanse in which it appears that ancient, advanced societies with spacefaring capabilities all suffered planet-wide catastrophe leading to the collapse of their technological structures. Some have hypothesized a cataclysmic chain of supernovae; others believe it was due to a subspace energy anomaly. Within our borders, we have charted three such planets: all home to fairly primitive civilizations but all showing evidence of prior, advanced societies being present. And the expanse extends well into the Outmarches - assuming it reaches the other side and into Federation space, it would encompass our current position.”

“We picked up old-fashioned radio waves,” Nyota said. “The kind you see on barely-industrialized worlds.”

Keras nodded grimly. “On our side of the Outmarches, these worlds are tormented by Vastaran pirates. Barely spacefaring themselves - the Vastarans make their living in the slave trade, as allies of the most unsavory branches of the Orion Syndicate. They take advantage of the technological backwardness of these planets to both exploit their people and operate comparatively undetected. It is…unfortunately common for Rihannsu soldiers or scientists to go missing in this sector.” A pained look flickered behind his eyes. “And I fear that is what may have happened to your crew members as well.”

“An intriguing theory,” Spock said coolly. “However, there are no ships in range of our scanners, so I fail to see just _who_ is meant to have abducted our officers.”

Keras regarded his Vulcan cousin for a moment, his eyes narrowed but his demeanor utterly calm. “Might I use your scanner, Commander?”

Spock raised an eyebrow, then nodded and stepped aside.

Keras’ fingers tapped lightly on the keypad as he stared intently at the viewscreen. He input a series of numbers - a harmonic frequency, an infrared signature, something to do with phase variance - and -

A ship appeared on the long-range sensors.

“The Vastarans use a kind of primitive cloaking technology,” explained Keras grimly. “We have learned to track them, through trial and error.”

“It looks like they just left orbit less than an hour ago,” Sulu put in from the helm. “Traveling at…warp 6.5.”

“Lay in a pursuit course, match speed and bearing,” Keras commanded, his voice clipped and authoritative.

Sulu hesitated. “Uh…sir?” He looked pleadingly at Kirk, who smiled ruefully.

“Do as he says, Lieutenant,” Kirk reassured him. “Let’s go get our people.”


	9. Hidden Faces

_Captain’s personal log, supplemental. We have tracked the Vastaran pirate ship we believe to be carrying our missing crew members to orbit around the third planet of the Nimbus system. The Enterprise is holding a discreet position just outside the range of planetary sensors, and I will be leading an away team to scope out the situation and, good fortune willing, recover our abducted officers. Mr. Spock will stay behind as acting captain. Dr. McCoy and Lieutenant Uhura will be joining me - as will Commander Keras. He has a greater knowledge of this region of space, and of this planet in particular. We are far from Earth, in a sort of no-man’s-land at the conjunction of Federation, Romulan and Klingon territory. His counsel will be invaluable as we explore these unknown reaches._

“Nimbus III,” Keras proclaimed, pacing around the perimeter of the briefing room as Kirk, Uhura, McCoy and Spock all sat around the table examining scans of the planet’s surface. “It is a harsh and inhospitable world, sparsely populated, resource-poor. According to some star charts it has the unique distinction of belonging to three galactic governments at once: according to the smugglers and slavers who do their business there, of course, it has the distinction of belonging to no government at all. We must tread carefully, and act quickly: the trade in flesh and blood is a fickle one.”

The monitor flickered and an image appeared: an aerial view of the planet’s largest settlement. It was a teeming, ramshackle town full of narrow streets and blind alleys. An imposing wall surrounded it.

“From what little radio chatter I’ve been able to pick up, I believe I have identified this city as the most likely place where our crew members might be being held,” Nyota continued. “It’s well guarded, but we should be able to beam down in one of these back alleyways without being detected.”

“We’ll need civilian clothing too, of course,” Kirk put in. “Something tells me a bunch of uniformed Starfleet officers wandering around town wouldn’t draw the right kind of attention.”

Keras raised an eyebrow, and nodded. “That much is certain.”

Kirk paused, then leaned back in his chair as if to get a better look at Keras. He tilted his head slightly, as if trying to place a familiar face. Then he nodded slowly, his eyes twinkling, and cracked a slow, wry smile.

“Not to mention, the sight of three Humans traveling alongside a Romulan. Three Humans and a Vulcan, on the other hand…”

***

Two hours later, the quartermaster thoroughly bothered and the material replicators thoroughly strained, four apparent civilians headed towards the transporter room to beam down to the planet’s surface. Spock and Scotty stood ready to see them off and operate the transporter.

Kirk and McCoy had opted for a basic frontier-scoundrel look, in nearly identical leather jackets, faded dark trousers and utility belts. Uhura wore a form-fitting blue dress and an old-fashioned denim blazer that concealed her phaser and tricorder in style.

But when Keras walked into the room, draped in traditional Vulcan robes in a rich mahogany-colored fabric, decorated with a gemstone-encrusted collar and an embroidered Surakian inscription along one side, it was all the entire away team could do not to burst into incredulous laughter.

He had thrown himself into the part. Even his bearing, his expression - did the man have frustrated ambitions for the theater, Kirk found himself wondering? Or was he simply so well trained in the arts of disguise and subterfuge that he could hardly do otherwise?

“Well would you look at that, Mr. Spock,” Kirk addressed his right-hand man with merciless mirth. “The spitting image. Why, he could almost be a relative of yours!”

Spock glanced at Keras, who gazed coolly back at him, and -

\- hesitated. For perhaps a single beat too long. Then -

“Hardly, Captain.”

They took their positions on the transporter pad and waited as Spock and Scotty worked at the console to finish calibrating the machinery.

“Captain, excuse me, but is this - “ Keras gestured vaguely to the three of them, in disguise, about to beam down to a hostile, pirate-controlled planet in pursuit of a team of missing ensigns after joining forces with a high-ranking officer of their planet’s sworn enemy - “a _common_ sort of occurrence in Starfleet?”

“Unfortunately yes,” McCoy interjected before Jim could reply. 

“Stand by to energize,” interrupted Scotty.

Then a countdown, a whir of energy, and they dissolved into air and light.

***

Later that afternoon, in sickbay, Nurse Christine Chapel was trying to do two people’s jobs at once. Dr. McCoy was on his way down to the planet with the away team and Nurse Dickinson had not arrived for her shift yet. Lieutenant Darcy had a sprained wrist, Ensign Takahashi was hearing voices, Crewman V’kral had indigestion. That wasn’t even considering the files to sort, the records to file, the papers to archive. So all things considered, when Lieutenant Stiles walked into sickbay neither bleeding, burned nor decapitated, Christine could be forgiven a snap of annoyance at him for wasting her time. “Not you too, what’s wrong with you?”

Stiles smiled sheepishly, almost too casually. “Ah, I’m fine, it’s just - you see, I’ve been working in the botany lab with Lieutenant Sulu, and he’s having a nasty allergic reaction to some of the pollen. No - no emergency of course!” he added hastily. “Just a rash, itchy, you know. He sent me down here to pick up an allergy hypo from the Doctor’s office, the lab medkit was out and he said Dr. McCoy always just lets him pick one up if he needs.”

Christine opened her mouth to retort by citing protocol and regulation, but just then V’kral turned an unsettling shade of blue and began to moan piteously, so she simply waved her hand at Stiles dismissively. “All right, sure, as long as you know what you’re looking for.”

He did know exactly what he was looking for. He stepped furtively into McCoy’s office, careful to let the door close behind him. Pulling down the sleeve of his uniform to cover his fingertips, he opened the door to the medical storage cooler and began carefully poring over vials and bottles and test tubes. When he found what he needed, he quickly slipped it into his pocket with a quiet sense of triumph.

***

A hot and dusty wind greeted the away team as they materialized in an empty alleyway somewhere on the outskirts of the settlement on Nimbus III. The planet’s sun beat down harshly in the mid-day hour, but the streets were so narrow and the buildings crammed so closely together that it was as dark as twilight on the ground.

Kirk looked surreptitiously at the readout on his tricorder. “Downtown is that way,” he said, pointing down an alley to his right, “or at least a heavily populated area. Let’s head in, but be careful. We play our cards right, we find out information that could lead us to our crew members. We bluff too hard or count on drawing a wild, all we do is create problems for ourselves, our comrades, and our ship.”

They began to walk in the direction Kirk had indicated, but McCoy stayed back a few steps and suddenly pulled Keras aside. “Let me make one thing very clear, _Commander,”_ he muttered darkly. “I don’t trust you, and I don’t know why Jim and Uhura do. I don’t know what your endgame is here, and I don’t want to know. All I know is that if you make any attempt, even the barest hint of a thought towards hurting either of them or sabotaging this mission - “ he scowled. “I would not hesitate for an instant to recant the entire Hippocratic oath on the spot.”

A dusty gust of wind punctuated the doctor’s words.

Keras narrowed his eyes. “Doctor, I quite literally owe you my life. On my homeworld, such an occurrence would be enough for me to declare a bond of peace and friendship between my house and yours for as long as both we and our children lived. I suppose things are different on yours,” he said frostily. “But of course, you have no reason to trust me. I only ask you to remember that here, on this planet, I am outnumbered three to one. On the Enterprise, three hundred to one. You may trust or distrust me as you see fit but do not take me for a fool.”

Then Keras shrugged and began walking to follow Jim and Nyota in to the center of town. His shadow grew longer as the planet’s sun sped towards the horizon.


	10. Shifting Sands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The plot thickens on Nimbus 3. [cw: discussion of slave trafficking.]

The away team decided to cover more ground by splitting up. Uhura and Keras would seek out taverns and marketplaces to see what information they could gather by eavesdropping, while Kirk and McCoy would climb into the hills that overlooked the city, to get a better vantage point and create at least a rudimentary map.

A tavern was easy to find: it appeared to be the main attraction in the entire town. A few batted eyelashes and coy smiles from Nyota for the benefit of the green-skinned bouncer, and they were in.

It was a dark, cavernous place, illuminated primarily by glowing advertisements and holographic gambling terminals, with the thumping, unsettling beat of an unknown planet’s take on house music playing in the background.

Keras looked around appraisingly, sizing up the joint. The low-level employees were all Orions and a handful of - oh, for the love of the Elements - Gorn. The bartender and apparent manager, though, were Andorians, he noticed with mild surprise. That was just as well - they brewed a tolerable ale.

“Where should we sit?” Nyota asked under her breath, switching languages. “At the bar?”

“Don’t speak Rihan,” Keras said sharply. “It’s too easily recognized in this sector, we’d be found out immediately. We must be as inconspicuous and forgettable as possible.”

_“You’re_ still speaking Rihan,” Nyota muttered back, motioning to his carefully-hidden earpiece.

Keras grimaced. “Indeed, as I have no choice. I will…” - he cast a helpless glance at the ceiling - “…speak quietly.”

He led her to a smallish table near enough to the bar to overhear most of what was said, but far enough out of the way that they wouldn’t be excessively molested by the bar flies and drunks. Nyota waved down a waiter and ordered two house ales, which arrived quickly - apparently, it was the only thing on tap.

Andorian ale, just as Keras had expected. It was a familiar, comforting shade of blue, almost a glimpse of home - an illusion that was instantly shattered in a way that felt like deliberate cruelty upon tasting it, and finding not the crisp herbal bite of fine Rihan _kali-fal_ but something muddy and grassy. Still, though, it quenched thirst well enough, and after a few sips it began to warm the belly in an altogether pleasant way.

The silence was an awkward one. Both of them sat dutifully eavesdropping on the goings-on around them, Keras leaning back wearily in his chair, Nyota perched on the edge of hers like a cat ready to pounce. Occasionally one would glance at the other, Nyota offering a distracted half-smile any time their eyes accidentally met. Nothing much seemed to be happening in the tavern.

Right, this was intolerable. And after all, Keras reasoned, it would look more suspicious for two people to be sitting at the same table and not talking to one another at all. So he leaned in close enough to be able to keep his voice low, and finally asked Nyota a question that had been bothering him for weeks: “Tell me…how is it possible for an Earth officer to have learned Rihan so fluently?”

Nyota’s eyes lit up and she smiled in the way people do when someone has asked them to expound on their favorite subject. “Oh, I studied it at the Academy. One of our professors that year had studied with the linguist who cataloged the language in the first place during…well, during the war…and she offered a graduate seminar in my last year.”

Keras considered this. “In…the military academy?”

“Well, no, Starfleet is not really a military force. We have tactical capabilities, but we’re more an organization of diplomats, explorers, scientists…” The look in her eyes was dreamy and proud, and she smiled a bit sheepishly at him. “Honestly, I took Rihan kind of on a whim. I was terribly curious when it was announced in the course catalog - the face of the unknown, a strange new challenge - I suppose I was also trying to win a bet,” she admitted with a giggle. “My friends and I had a running competition to see who could pick up the most useless and obscure knowledge every year.”

Keras quickly took a sip of ale to muffle a laugh.

“Of course, I lost the bet now,” she mused. “As it’s turned out to be very useful after all.”

“On ch’Rihan only the highest-level intelligence specialists can even get authorization to study off-world languages,” Keras said. “It’s considered dangerous knowledge. Sometimes even communication among regions breaks down for a lack of properly trained translators - we have three dialects, but I suppose you know that.”

“I understand all three,” Nyota reminded him teasingly. (He took another, large swig of ale in resignation.)

“How many dialects does Earth have?” he asked curiously.

“Well, everyone speaks Standard at this point,” she admitted. “But in terms of local languages we’re still at well over two thousand, and that’s without even counting the paleolinguistic revival movements all over the world.”

Keras’ eyes nearly fell out of his head. “Two _thousand?”_

Nyota nodded nonchalantly and sipped her ale. “It’s terrible, isn’t it? So many have been lost to history. Even as recently as the late twenty-first century there were almost three times as many.”

Keras shook his head in disbelief.

Then again, he supposed, the Earthers had evolved on their own home planet and stayed there, splintering into faction upon faction, tribe upon tribe. His own people were born from exile, their single ancestral language artificially created as a deliberate act of rebellion. Against his better judgement, he found himself developing a powerful curiosity about the planet he had considered enemy territory for his whole life.

“You weren’t wrong about one thing, though,” Nyota said thoughtfully. “Now that I think about it. Starfleet Academy is more than a military academy, but the Rihan I learned was a military language. All we had to go on was intercepted communications during the war, even Dr. Sato couldn’t reconstruct much more than wartime vocabulary from it.” She chuckled ruefully. “So my cultural knowledge is a bit lacking. I can order a full spread of photon torpedoes or give orders to engage the cloaking device without a moment’s thought, but if anyone asked me…I don’t know…how the Romulans celebrate their new year, or who their greatest poet is - I’d have absolutely no idea.” She looked him in the eye and grinned. “I barely even knew what to do with myself when you introduced yourself to me by your full name, it was half a page long!” A quiet peal of laughter.

“Come now, I only gave you the first three,” he said with a wry expression.

Her eyes were bright and eager, her smile sincere. There wasn’t a single atom of her that saw him as the enemy, he thought with something bordering on alarm, so unexpected was the realization.

She was also insistent, determined to uncover the cultural mysteries of the Romulan people in one afternoon over a warm Andorian ale. “Well, just your first name then. What does it mean?” she pressed him.

Keras sighed. He supposed indulging her curiosity couldn’t do any harm under the circumstances.

“Well, like any formal Rihan name, my full name is more a map of my family tree and my relation to power than anything about my own self,” he explained. “My given name, “Keras” means nothing; it is merely a fashionable adaptation of an old Vulcan name. My second name, ir-Elehu, speaks of where I was born. And my third name is my house name, Chironsala, a very old and very far-fallen noble family, many generations in decline.”

“But that’s beautiful,” Nyota protested. “To carry all your heritage and the name of your homeland around with you. Names are powerful things, and it’s good to remember where you come from.”

Keras looked at her for a long moment, seeing her as if for the first time. Her wide dark eyes were fixed on him with an absolute absence of insincerity, a kind of youthful wonder and inquisitiveness that he himself had not felt in many years. She was a linguist, he remembered, a translator: by nature curious, fascinated by the foreign and the new, seeking first to understand and communicate with the unknown, and delighting in nearly everything she found. And somehow even the harsh light of the tavern’s lurid decor still framed her in a soft golden haze, like a painter’s finest detailing reflecting off her elegant dark skin and the midnight-black curls of her hair.

“What does your name mean, in your language?” he found himself asking.

A sly, proud look crossed her face. “Well, since you asked, _nyota_ means “star,” and _uhura,_ my family name, means “freedom.” She laughed and took another sip of her drink. “I was born to be an adventurer, careening across the galaxy…”

“That’s magnificent,” Keras murmured. “It suits you. The freedom of the stars themselves is in you.”

He took a swig of his ale and pulled himself together. “On ch’Rihan you would be called Saeihr, we also name our favorite daughters after the stars,” he continued in a lightly teasing tone. “And where are you from?”

“I’ve lived all over, I suppose, but I grew up in a city called Nairobi.”

“And your third name, I know not how…” he furrowed his brow. “There is no house name that matches. It would be a brave and foolhardy Rihanha indeed who named a child for freedom or independence these days. But we still do have a word for it, after all…”

He smacked a hand decisively down on the table. “All right: I have it. You are Saeihr i-Nairobi t’Daemnha, and may you ever walk beneath the raptor’s wings.”

Nyota laughed in delight. “Oh, I like it!”

She repeated the name several times, trying it on for size, accustoming her voice to the foreign sounds.

Keras gazed at her in wonder. He still couldn’t quite get over it: an Earther, not only speaking flawless Rihan but taking evident pleasure in it. The extraordinary sound of the Rihan language itself with a foreign, off-world accent. A vision of peace. Of beauty. Of _joy._

“Eventually,” he said softly, “you would have a _rehei,_ a fourth name, as well. But I cannot give it to you, your fourth name is something you choose for yourself, something that reflects your innermost truth, and something you keep secret. A Rihanha reveals their fourth name to maybe one or two people over the course of their lives.” He looked into his drink, suddenly a bit embarrassed.

The tavern door opened and a group of alien men walked in. They were stocky, clad in leather and heavily armed, bald and scowling, with pale gray skin and small glittering yellow eyes.

Keras tensed, almost imperceptibly, but Nyota noticed the way he tightened his grip on his flagon and stiffened his back. “What is it?” she asked under her breath.

He grimaced, looking away from the door so as not to attract attention. “Those men are Vastarans,” he explained. “I think we have come to the right place.”

***

The Nimbus star was a pale white giant, and cast a light that was somehow both harsher and weaker than the light of either Sol or Eisn. The atmosphere, too, was thin compared to Earth’s, and Kirk and McCoy found themselves both huffing for breath as they trudged up the sandy hillside outside of town.

There was a cold silence between the two men as they scanned the horizon, aiming their tricorders down at the city that sprawled out beneath them. Their instruments whirred cheerfully as they took detailed maps of the town: its narrow alleyways, teeming market squares and shady warehouses, ramshackle huts and taverns, a large palatial complex to the north, and what looked distinctly like a thriving red-light district to the south.

Finally McCoy broke the silence with a grumble. “Look, Jim, pardon the honesty but I just don’t understand what you’re doing. And I can’t keep quiet about it anymore.”

Kirk looked at him sharply. “At the moment, we’re on a search and rescue mission to recover three missing crew members, that’s what we’re doing.”

McCoy exhaled. “That’s not what I mean and you know it.” He turned to his captain with a pleading expression. “What’s _he_ doing here? It’s bad enough you took him off his ship after he tried to destroy us all, and made him our problem all over again! But now he’s part of our crew? Running missions with us? You’re letting him take Lieutenant Uhura off God knows where and assuming he’ll adhere to the honor system in bringing her back?”

“He has firsthand knowledge of this sector and this planet, he is an asset to our recovery efforts,” Kirk raised his voice warningly.

“My God, Jim!” McCoy clenched and unclenched his fists and leaned back to look despairingly at the sickly white sky. “You just believe every word that comes out of his mouth, no questions asked! If I didn’t know any better, I’d - “ he cut himself off abruptly.

“You’d what, Bones?” Jim turned to face him directly and stepped closer so they were eye to eye. McCoy looked back defiantly.

“Well, I’d wonder if maybe Lieutenant Stiles had a point when he wondered if certain members of the crew might be compromised!”

Jim’s eyes flashed with anger. “I am a Starfleet captain,” he snapped. “It is my sworn duty to seek out and make contact - peaceful contact - with new civilizations. There was no reason to leave him to die when the option was there to choose peace and work towards open communication - that’s in the rulebook too, _Doctor,_ and as someone sworn to _do no harm_ I’d assume you’d be sympathetic. I don’t remember this level of outrage when we finally made contact with Balok!”

“But he’s not a _new civilization,_ that’s just the point!” He grabbed Kirk’s arm. “Jim, he’s a Romulan! We know what they’re like, we’ve lost thousands of lives to them! This isn’t some kind of first contact situation! And now with the war still in living memory, you invite the commander of the enemy flagship - “ He looked at his feet and cut himself off. “I don’t know, Captain. Balok, the Tholians, whatever the hell else happened this year - they were _strange,_ we couldn’t _know_ if they really were just trying to say hello. This time we can’t say that. Or even maybe it’s _because_ he’s so like us that this time feels like a bridge too far. Knowing what human beings have been capable of, and seeing someone so…so human.” He faltered.

“Bones, I - look.” Kirk sighed and ran a hand through his hair in irritation. “If I can’t convince you, I can’t convince you. But I am your commanding officer, and I’m going to have to just ask you to trust me.”

McCoy shook his head. “I just don’t know if I can do that, sir.”

There was a moment’s silence as they looked warily at each other, then Kirk turned his back on McCoy and continued his way up the hillside. “Then follow orders,” he said coldly.

The sandy hillside crumbled and shifted beneath their feet as they continued on their mission in renewed silence. At any moment, it seemed like the ground itself would be swept away beneath them.

***

The Vastarans swaggered through the tavern, and wherever they went, voices hushed and faltered. Keras watched their every step with a burning gaze, his lips pressed tightly together, the knuckles of his right hand white as he unconsciously gripped the edge of the table. Nyota glanced at him worriedly, and shifted in her seat just enough to feel her phaser resting reassuringly against her side.

“Well, look at that,” came a mocking voice from behind Nyota’s back. “We don’t see many Vulcans around these parts…and we don’t see many Humans either. Just imagine the odds of finding a matched pair!”

The Vastarans laughed. One of them jabbed Keras between the shoulder blades with the butt of a disruptor rifle. “You’re a long way from home, logic boy,” he sneered. “Is she worth the trouble?”

More laughter. Nyota opened her mouth to retort but was cut off by a sudden wave of apprehension. _Don’t say anything,_ the words almost formed themselves audibly in her mind as Keras shot a warning glance at her.

Keras stared resolutely ahead as the Vastarans taunted and shoved him - he couldn’t break character and reveal an emotional reaction, Nyota realized, or their cover would be instantly blown.

“The female’s still worth something, at least,” one of the pirates jeered, running a clammy hand down Nyota’s neck that made her shudder. “But old pointy-ears here? Doubtful to say the least…”

“What do you say, little lady?” Another of the men pushed his face so close to hers that she could smell his terrible, metallic breath, and leered obscenely. “Is he any good? Does he make you scream?” The Vastarans snickered. “Think he could please an Orion bandit queen?”

“Oh, get _off_ me!” Nyota snapped and shoved the man away.

Instantly the high-pitched whine of charging disruptors filled the air. Keras leaped to his feet, knocking over his chair and both their drinks in his fury as he flung himself across the table to push Nyota out of harm’s way. A rifle fired off-target, a paving-stone exploded in a shower of sparks and debris, and the other patrons of the tavern shrieked and dove under their tables.

_“ALL RIGHT, THAT’S ENOUGH!”_ A voice burst out from a dark corner behind the bar, and a craggy old Andorian with a full beard and a missing antenna came into view.

“You pirate bastards want to conduct _business,_ go back to Grellek’s compound where you belong!” shouted the Andorian. “This bar is _my_ place of business, and anyone who causes trouble in here is not welcome!” He unholstered a small but vicious-looking phaser pistol and pointed it directly at the apparent leader of the Vastaran gang. “Now we can either do this the _easy_ way, or the _hard_ way!”

A tense silence fell as all eyes fixed on the standoff between one elderly, infuriated Andorian bartender and three leering Vastaran slave traders. Then slowly, reluctantly, sharing sidelong looks among themselves and deciding it just wasn’t worth it, the Vastarans lowered their weapons and lumbered out of the tavern.

Nyota exhaled slowly, and Keras sat down while still glaring at the pirates’ retreating backs. The bartender approached them with a bottle of Saurian brandy and three large shot glasses.

“Sorry about that,” he said with a disdainful scowl, and poured them each a drink. “It just gets worse and worse these days. Please, this is on the house.”

Nyota sipped cautiously at hers, while Keras immediately threw his back in one shot, closing his eyes and shuddering.

“What brings you two to a place like this, anyway? It’s plain as day you’re not from around here,” the Andorian continued.

“We’re just…looking for a place to make a fresh start,” Nyota improvised carefully. “You know how it is…I wasn’t accepted on Vulcan, he was treated poorly on Earth…” She placed a hand on Keras’ shoulder and smiled tenderly at him. “So we thought we’d head for the wild frontier.”

“Yes, it seemed logical at the time,” Keras said solemnly, kicking her surreptitiously under the table. “Unfortunately, it appears we were misinformed as to the cultural proclivities of this planet.”

“Aaaah.” The Andorian tossed back his own shot of brandy with a nonchalant flourish. “You heard from someone - damn, that burns - either very old or very naive. They used to say this place, in neutral territory, could be a haven of galactic peace. There was just the little problem that to build paradise here, you’d have to uproot hell first.”

“Those horrible men that just came in,” Nyota pressed on, her eyes wide with innocence. “Were they… _slave traders?”_

The bartender grunted in agreement. “Yeah, and you see more of them by the day around here. Market’s booming what with the Klingons expanding their dilithium mines and those shady Federation undercover types building those mysterious new outposts of theirs.”

Keras raised a silent eyebrow.

The brandy was already going to the Andorian’s head - he appeared to be, despite his grizzled appearance, a lightweight - and his nose was beginning to flush cobalt, his one remaining antenna to droop slightly askew. “It’s all just gone to the rats since Grellek took control of the whole Syndicate. At least back in the day they _tried_ to keep their filthy dealings a secret, nowadays they’re selling living people like meat-stock in her palace courtyard every day in broad daylight.”

“Indeed?” Keras said grimly. “Then we have been told untruths about this planet.” He abruptly stood up with a theatrical sweep of his robes. “We must travel onward. This is no peaceful home for us. I thank you most sincerely for your hospitality, and for intervening in our moment of danger.”

The Andorian smiled ruefully, a bit taken aback by Keras’ sudden departure. “All part of the job, but it’s a pleasure, Mister….?” He trailed off, looking inquisitively at the dignified Vulcan man standing before him, waiting to hear what to call him.

“S’Task,” Keras supplied a bit too quickly.

“Well then Mr. S’Task, Mrs. S’Task,” the bartender concluded with a hiccup. “I wish you safe travels, as far away as you can fly, and don’t let me ever catch you on this forsaken rock ever again.”

Keras strode out the door at a feverish pace, leaving Nyota scrambling to keep up.

_“That_ was a gamble,” he exhaled, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow. “I can only thank the Elements that the frontier tavern-keeper was as illiterate as he looked.”

Nyota cast him a curious glance.

“S’Task was the founding father of the Rihannsu people, the leader of our exile from Vulcan, and - since you asked earlier - our greatest poet,” Keras explained, as a wave of something that felt like simultaneous blind terror and hysterical laughter rose up uncontrollably in his chest. “It was the only Vulcan name that came to me on the spot like that, my mind had gone _blank_. But no matter: we have what we came for. A name and a place. The Orion bandit queen, Grellek.”

As they walked through the darkening streets of the nameless city on their way back to the rendezvous point, Nyota began to notice that Keras’ face was pale, his breathing shallow and nervous.

“Keras, are you all right?” she asked quietly.

He waved a hand dismissively. “It is nothing.”

They walked in silence for a few more minutes, then he sighed.

“I have been here before,” he confessed. “Many years ago, when I was very young. Two of my crewmates and I were kidnapped by these same Orion Syndicate slave-traffickers, and I only escaped with my life thanks to a comrade who sacrificed hers. I was never certain where exactly we had been held, but now I am: it was here. Without question. The memories are…unpleasant ones.”

He glanced at Nyota and saw her face filled with such a stricken expression that he chuckled. “Worry not, _saeihrai,”_ he reassured her a bit wryly. “I am an old soldier, after all. And too well trained to permit it to compromise my duties.” 

Just then Nyota’s communicator chirped. “Kirk to Uhura, come in, please.”

“Here, Captain.”

“We’ve reached the rendezvous point. What’s your status?”

“On our way, sir. We’ve got some useful information.”

“Us too. See you soon then. Kirk out.”

When they met at their well-hidden rendezvous spot just outside of town, there was a moment’s frosty silence before Kirk pulled up the scans they had made of the town and its surrounding area. Keras wasted no time.

“There,” he said confidently, pointing to the outline of the palatial compound at the north end of town. It had a vast courtyard, and what looked like a small stage with room for an audience.

“And just what makes you so damn sure of that so fast, _Commander?”_ asked McCoy sourly.

Keras shot him an irritated glare. “Well, after Lieutenant Nyota and I were nearly abducted and vaporized by a gang of Vastaran slavers ourselves, a local businessman was kind enough to tell us what’s been going on in this town lately.”

“I’m listening, Keras,” Kirk interjected.

Keras gave him a grudging eyebrow of thanks, and continued. “He said that for some time now the city has been under the control of an Orion named Grellek, and that the slave trade is under her direct purview. And that most of the business transactions take place at her compound, during the daytime.” He smirked slightly. “With my newfound Vulcan powers of deductive reasoning, it was a fairly obvious inference.”

McCoy rolled his eyes and muttered a plea for mercy to the heavens. He could only deal with _one_ Vulcan, thankyouverymuch.

“Then we should move by first light,” Kirk decided. “It will be too heavily guarded overnight, and during the day there might be…well…a crowd we can try to blend into.”

Keras nodded. “My thoughts exactly, Captain.”

Night fell over the desolate wastes of Nimbus III. The pale moon hung high in the sky, casting long shadows in its eerie silver light. It was going to be a long night of planning, overplaying, re-planning and worrying, Kirk thought to himself, and he knew not one of the four of them would get a wink of sleep.


End file.
